First flag referendum results released

With all votes counted, it's now confirmed Kyle Lockwood's black and blue silver fern design will be going up against the current New Zealand flag in the second referendum next March.

Today's announcement comes after the preliminary count last Friday, which favoured Lockwood's black and blue silver fern edging out its red and blue counterpart by 1.06 percent.

The final count has cemented the black and blue design as the one which will be battling in next year's final binding referendum.

Voting was open for three weeks before closing at 7pm on Friday. Final numbers show 1.5 million Kiwis cast their vote – 48.78 percent of enrolled voters. That includes nearly 150,000 informal votes (9.7 percent) and 3372 invalid votes (0.22 percent).